Let's take a look at 2009 in the United States. Gun related homicides are at around eleven thousand, with suicides bringing a further eleven thousand, and with accidents involving firearms being just under a thousand. We wind up with a total of around twenty-three thousand firearm related deaths, which is still ten thousand less than the thirty-three thousand people who died as a result of various automobile related deaths for that same year. These roadway affairs are deaths we give our consent to every time we use paved ground or operate a motor vehicle- for the convenience of our society as a whole, we give these lives in tribute.
We mourn and place flowers at the roadside, but we go on with our lives, not thinking for more than perhaps a moment to abolish the transportation system which enables (this is a key word) these deaths to happen. Unlike deaths caused by firearms, of course, most of these are not suicides or homicides but just accidents- and, in a way, that seems even worse. With homicides and suicides we can address the issue of mental health, economic struggle, and so on. With accidents we can.. try to make our tools safer, and still endorse needless deaths as necessary for American ease of living.
